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ESSAYS AND ADDRESSES
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The Jaina metaphysician is warned against falling into error by the mere appearance of contradiction in form; for, as is evident from the illustration regarding the nature of the world, not all contradictions are real. In order to constitute a real contradiction the affirmance and denial will both have to proceed from the same standpoint. For instance, of the statements A is dead" and "A is not dead," when they proceed from the same standpoint, one, or may be both are bound to be false, for it cannot well be that A is both alive and dead, when the question of his death is considered from one and the same point of view. But when taken from different standpoints, there is no necessary contradiction involved in them; for A may be dead as A, but not dead from the point of view of the soul which is immortal. For this reason the student of metaphysics in Jainism is advised to mentally insert the word syat (literally, in some way) before every statement of a fact that he comes across, to warn him that it has been made from one particular point of view, which he should engage himself to discover. In this way he is not frightened by the contradictions he sometimes encounters in the course of his study, and is not baffled by them. In other words, where an untrained novice is likely to lose his head in dumb-founding bewilderment produced by such seemingly irreconcilable statements as the world is nitya-anitya," and to spurn or to turn away from the truth, the Syadvadist, that is to say, the Jaina Metaphysician, is sure to acquire the true insight into the nature of things, and, ultimately, also, mastery over the empire of nature, inasmuch as knowledge is power whereby men have subdued and are now subduing nature!
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